| viet | On November 1, 1963, Vietnamese President Ngô Đ́nh Diệm was overthrown and quickly killed. Generals Duong Van "Big" Minh and General Don took over in a CIA supported coup. |
| raq | On February 8, 1963, Iraqi Prime Minister Abd al-Karim Qasim was overthrown and quickly killed by the Ba'athist party in a CIA supported coup. Qasim had five years earlier overthrown the US backed monarchy of Nuri Said. The 1963 coup was followed by thousands of deaths in a general 'purge'; Saddam Hussein himself committed some of his first murders during that time. In 1968 the CIA supported another coup that brought Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr to power. Al-Bakr became President of Iraq and remained so until he was removed from power by his cousin Saddam Hussein in 1979. |
the lies
| viet | On August 3, 1964, the USS Maddox was approached in the Gulf of Tonkin by 3 North Vietnamese patrol boats in waters claimed by North Vietnam. The Maddox opened fire on the North Vietnamese patrol boats, and US Navy jets from the USS Ticonderoga attacked all three patrol boats, killing 4 North Vietnamese and heavily damaging two boats. On the stormy night of August 4, 1964, the USS Maddox and USS Turner Joy reported that they were under attack. There was no attacker; they opened fire at radar ghosts. US forces quickly realized there was most likely no attacker, but communications to Washington were garbled and no attempt to correct the mistaken impression of "another" North Vietnamese "attack" was made. On August 7, 1964, the US Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin resolution which started the Vietnam War. The United States started the Vietnam War. |
| raq | "There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction." "There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, againt our allies, and against us." - Shotgun Cheney, August 26, 2002 "We know they have weapons of mass destruction." "There isn't any debate about it" - Secretary of Destruction Rummy, September 26, 2002 "Iraq could decide on any given day to provide a biological or chemical weapon to a terrorist group or individual terrorists." - Shrub, October 7, 2002 "...we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud." - Condi my other car is a Chevron oil tanker Rice, September 8, 2002 |
the cost in human lives lost
| viet | civilians - 4 million North Vietnam military - 1.1 million US Armed Forces - 58,209 and 1,947 missing |
| raq | civilians - between 86,670 and 655,000 and counting US Armed Forces - 4150 and counting |
the refugees
the financial cost
| viet | Total cost of the Vietnam war was $600 billion in today's dollars |
| raq | Iraq war has cost nearly $500 billion - half a trilllion dollars - to date - and total costs are estimated at 1 to 2 trillion dollars |
the end
foreign policy highlights of the Reagan years
 Iraqi President Saddam Hussein greets Donald Rumsfeld, special envoy of President Ronald Reagan December 20, 1983 |
 "North had taken the money and put it in a Swiss bank account... to be used for the contras... It's going to be a major flap" Vice President Bush's diary entry, November 24, 1986 |
During the 1980 - 1988 Iran-Iraq war the United Status conveniently managed to support both sides, giving battlefield intelligence and other aid to Iraq, and then selling missiles to Iran in order to gain freedom for hostages held by Hezbolah in Beirut in the infamous Iran - Contra scandal. Iraq used chemical weapons throughout most of the war and was using them when Rumsfeld met Hussein. Iraq used the satellite photos the US supplied to help target their chemical weapons on the Iranians. Once Hezbolah realized that contrary to publicly stated US policy, Reagan would negotiate with terrorists, they took more hostages in Beirut.
"The loud little handful -- as usual -- will shout for the war. The pulpit will -- warily and cautiously -- object -- at first; the great, big, dull bulk of the nation will rub its sleepy eyes and try to make out why there should be a war, and will say, earnestly and indignantly, "It is unjust and dishonorable, and there is no necessity for it." Then the handful will shout louder. A few fair men on the other side will argue and reason against the war with speech and pen, and at first will have a hearing and be applauded; but it will not last long; those others will outshout them, and presently the anti-war audiences will thin out and lose popularity. Before long you will see this curious thing: the speakers stoned from the platform, and free speech strangled by hordes of furious men who in their secret hearts are still at one with those stoned speakers -- as earlier -- but do not dare to say so. And now the whole nation -- pulpit and all -- will take up the war-cry, and shout itself hoarse, and mob any honest man who ventures to open his mouth; and presently such mouths will cease to open. Next the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception."
Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger, Chapter 9